One thing to consider is we are berthing much larger vessels in berths that were not really designed for them. There are a couple of ports that I am aware of where the clearance at either end is a few metres and the manoeuvre is accomplished using electronics. The aviation industry would simply extend the runway.
Berthing a ULCC requires a closing speed on the berth so low that it is difficult to judge by eye alone.
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being able to see real motion at very slow speed, to me, is a defining criteria in determing pilot ability.
Take with a grain of salt.
As I respond to this thread, I take pause to reflect to the statement given by Captain Edward Smith to the New York Times May 16, 1907, after arriving in New York on the SS Adriatic. In the article, he described his maritime career. His statement and the sinking of the Titanic April 16, 1912 reminds me of a mariner’s belief and a culture that it is impossible to experience every challenge and it is my hope is I never will. Back to the topic of Navigation and ship handling skills.
I agree with the premise of the thread. However, the concept of a well-rounded/ holistic deck officer maybe a myth. This leads me to the several questions,” What style of deck officer will let you, as the Master, sleep at night”? or “Captain what keeps you up at night?” My hope is I never wake up to a marine incident that maybe displayed on local and/or national news media. e.g., grounding or a collision. That is why, throughout my career, I have carried license protection insurance. Simply out of caution, I have placed on retainer an admiralty attorney 24/7 even when a company says it has my back.
Following the threads on gCaptain, I believe that any key benchmarks on essential skills will vary from industry sectors and a mariner’s training base. However, in considering a compromise, I also believe that there is a common set of benchmarks that could transcends all sectors of our industry. They are the risk elements and threat landscape of the Rules of the Road and the indented purpose of the COLREGs to prevent collisions at sea.
The foundation of a skill based discussion could be generated by using official and non-official data e.g., U.S. Coast Guard, NTSB, other countries MIRB, articles, or media sources etc…
The purpose of the discussion is to identify and developing skill base set of task that: (1) supports the prudent practice of situational awareness; (2) develops critical think and problem solving regarding specific Navigation Rules that are ambiguous or undefined. (3) the process of accident development and (4) the use of mental math skills e.g., the use of the Rule of 60 in (a) solving time, speed, and distance (b) determining angle and distance calculations (radian rule); (c) the concept of Constant Bearing, Decreasing Range (CBDR) principles and the analysis of bearing drift, (d) the advantages of electronics in aiding a reliable workable avoidance solution. Each skill can start an in-depth conversation related to a particular officer trait and skill.
I offer a few articles used by some of the Senior Officers and Master’s that I worked with. Over time, I finally realized that the issues, text, and context that were being discussed have been with us for generations.
• “Special Circumstances” by Lieutenant Raymond F. Farwell, U. S. Naval Reserve. Reference Nov 1935 US Naval Institute Proceedings.
• “When Am I Committed to Collision?” by Lieutenant Jotham M. Myers, U.S. Naval Reserve, Reference Dec 1972 US Naval Institute Proceedings.
• “When meeting, carefully assess other vessel’s bearing, course.” by Professional Mariner Staff July 29, 2015.
Also. I would recommend gCaptain Forum on Navigation Rules and the supportive documents provided in the discussion. The forums can be used as a major tool to enhance a discussion across the industry on a specific subject and actions regarding the Rules.
Any article chosen for a discussion should provide not only the issue, text and context to the complexity of the Navigation Rules. Presenting the application of multiple rules in a highly dynamic and complex environment vice the practice of memorizing an individual rule and then responding to it as a licensing test question.
When engaging in a secondary level analysis of the Navigation Rules the junior officer should address narratives that highlights the more complex discussion of the Rules. This is done by developing scenarios that expose the Infinite shades of gray which challenge the mariner’s situational awareness and decision-making capabilities regarding the vagueness of the rules, interpretation of obligations including, standing orders, the use of electronic and visual identification of the prevailing situation, and proper situational maneuvering principles.
Using tabletop, forum discussions and/or maritime simulators to provide the framework to the purpose of the exercise. Each scenario should determine in follow up discussion as to whether initial action would or would not have created a cascading event. The sources for the scenarios should come from previous marine accidents and court interpretation relating to the causation aspect of the accident or incident being discussed including lessons learned.
After reading and discussing the events and lessons learned the final question, I was always present with was - Why won’t this happen on our ship?
Later discussions should take in consideration ship handling of vessels less than 1600 GRT and those greater than 1600 GRT.
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I wish they would do that in Asia ( sail) so they can understand wind and current on a vessel.
Makes a difference in DP.
Not to mention the IMO should make ship handling mandatory to get a STCW license as in your on the sticks.
They should be able to do a Mediterranean moor whilst blindfolded
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Yes, there certainly could be, depends upon what is meant by the technical aspect. Operationally the officer should know what information is required for any given situation and which sequence of actions is required for each…
But here’s the thing. In order to get an ARPA certificate I had to sit in class for x hours and then I had to demonstrate the skills. The instructor stood next to me with a stopwatch and read off a list of tasks one-by one and watched while I did them.
The amount of time it took and my rank in class gave me confidence that I was sufficiently technically proficient.
My kid graduated from SUNY Maritime and he can barely dock our Whaler.
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standing an effective watch on a large ship has absolutly nothing at all to do with being able to handle a small boat. Being able to handle a small boat - has something to do with driving a big one.
Operating larger sailboats under power is particularly good ( heavy - low HP, deeper )
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Yes, agreed. the intersection between the two sets is where information can be cross-checked, also of course there’s an area where one method is going to work better. It’s can also be thought of as along a spectrum.
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Docking a small boat with an outboard is more difficult than a larger one with inboard propulsion. They are more susceptible to variable wind and wave conditions and the fact that rudder and prop are integrated makes close maneuvering awkward.
It shouldn’t have. Effective radar usage is as much of an art as visual navigation. We’ve seen in this thread that some people think a modern radar can’t pick out a small vessel from sea clutter, and various other examples of not knowing how to use a tool to it’s full potential.
The issue is that you’re de-prioritizing more accurate tools in the favor of less accurate ones. This is a common theme on the forum. It’s certainly true that doing things by eye will lead to less stress and less work load as the brain is designed to interpret those things better and faster. But should it? I would say no. Because the eye can miss things that the instruments, correctly and skillfully used, will not. After all, restricted visibility happens once a day, duration depending on latitude and season, and far more often depending on the area and it’s propensity for fogs, storms, white outs and the like.
So what navigation and ship handling skills should a junior officer have without instruments? None. They should be using all their tools and nervous and raising the bridge condition if they lose one. A senior officer yes. If they’re not looking out the window enough to develop those skills as they go along they should be forcing themselves to do so. They have the experience to decide if they can proceed with the loss or failure of an instrument, or just decide the situation will be easier to handle visually.
You can learn navigation without instruments while using instruments, but you can’t learn to process information flow if you remove pieces of it. But!
Learning navigation without instruments can be a part of a tradition designed to instill good seamanship. Coastal Transportation being a good example. I don’t think their program works because it’s a good plan for training ships officers. I think their program works because it instills the importance the company places on good seamanship. The bottom line being it works.
Yup, dropping off a big sportfisheman and taking the Whaler back home, the little boat is harder to dock. Can’t turn in place for one thing. OTOH it only weighs about 600 pounds with me in it, so I can fend off with one hand.
This is to me totally backwards. One of the first things we learn at how to be a flight instructor school is primacy. People remember the FIRST thing they learn, so NEVER teach them anything the wrong way and try and fix it later.
I can’t imagine learning to handle a boat or airplane by looking at screens first and then learning to look outside later. If you don’t know what the devices are trying to accomplish, you’ll never know when they lead you astray. I learned to take a bearing on traffic and watch out if that bearing didn’t change when I was about 12 years old. Later on it made total sense to lay an EBL on a radar target. Visually you see small boats or even big ones vanish and reappear behind waves on a rough day. It then makes total sense that radar targets might do the same.
Learning that what you see on the screen is what actually exists to me seems backwards and dangerous. Kind of like the morons that go by me at night with their faces bright lit by what looks like a couple of TV sets, if you aren’t on that screen you don’t exist to them.
- also going nuts with a flight student right now whose plane has enough screens and automation to put the average Airbus to shame and is constantly losing the plot with his head down typing away as fast as he can
agree - on the electronics working better - on a usual port for us there were quite a few shallow spots in the pilot pick up area - and depending what we needed for a lee - we might have to take them closer than we might have liked. by far the most efficent tool during these manuvers was a parallel index line set up on the radar. Outside it we were good, inside it - maybe not - and all it took was a quick glance at the radar.
And if you were to hit a guy whose running lights had gone out during the voyage (or who forgot to turn them on), an incredibly common occurrence, you would blame the guy for not keeping his running lights in proper order instead of yourself for not effectively using the tools at your disposal.
I have soft alarms that go off to remind me to make a visual check, frequency depending on speed and area. Do you utilize the same or depend on yourself not to get distracted? Electronics can help visual navigation too.
What’s backwards is not teaching people the effective use of tools and their limitations. Most of the objections are by people who think you can’t determine a kayak from a small wave by its radar signature and others of the like.
I know, I know not legal - but if I hit a Kayak with my 800 ft tanker - it is his fault
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Sure, but given the option I’m sure you would prefer to avoid running one down and you probably have a pretty loud horn on that thing.
Well… somewhat sure, they can be annoying.
Take with a grain of salt.
The key takeaway of the forum, in my opinion, should be to identify the fact that a mariner gravitates to what they are most comfortable with in any given situations. At times there seems to be general feeling that once out of a comfort zone the mariner assumes that they are being programed for failure.
Again, my opinion, Masters, coaches, and/or mentors need to creating opportunities and trust that can overcome a mariner’s confidence barriers. The question as “Why do you not use your visual skills?” the response usually is “I am not comfortable with the process”. Mariner’s schooling and training has provided multiple positive reinforce opportunities in the use of electronics not so much as to the hands-on use of visual methods.
My example is teaching vessel handling and proficiency at docking and undocking vessels whether single screw or twin screw. This hands-on training that can build confidence in that particular skill set.
While books on twin screws describes docking by twisting into or away from a dock using a mooring line but another possible skill not necessarily described in the books would be how to flank or side walking the vessel to or away from the pier.
Taking the book knowledge out of the classroom and having the opportunity to do it on the water until the skill mastered is positive reinforcement. Once this skill tried and understood it becomes something to be tired and used on other twin-screw vessels in different situations.
A similar skill set, for a special group of deep-sea mariners, is the ability to do an underway replenishment at sea. To accomplish this will require a multitude seamanship, navigational and visual skill sets, to place two ships operate a safe separation of 140 - 200 ft apart at a speed of 12 kts. This skill set needs to be observed and conducted at sea. Eventually even this can be mastered by a mariner.
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Not by all mariners. Only a handful out of the pool of AB’s on a SUPPLY class ship are able to qualify to steer during UNREP’s. The selection is made during pre-deployment shake downs and sea trials.
Your point is well taken “Not by all mariners” have this opportunity to do this or even want it to do it. My concentration was on the skill sets of the conning of the ship to achieve this evolution.
You brought into an additional aspect of the qualifying skills to steer not only by degrees but half degrees during the UNREP. This is a skill set that I respect. Especially given one degree presents a possible 20 ft closure rate of the separation between the two vessels.
Having the skill and concentration it takes to keep it along side when conducting transfers and during breakaway is a remarkable process.
Thank you for pointing this out.
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